My agency is hosting a competition. A competition to come up with a video that has potential to go viral. There are eight offices and only one prize. You know I'm going to try and win this. It's just my nature to compete.
To compete, you are required to develop a video three minutes or less, focusing on a charity of your choice. The only thing is you must include our agency's website and a provided end card. The strategy is pretty wide open, drive people to help.
This weekend I spent concepting an idea, getting all the supplies and finalizing the storyboards. It really took me back to Grad School when we were competing to be accepted into the program.
Making a video that "goes viral" is not easy. It's like guerrilla marketing, it could be wildly successful or it could fall on it's face. Here are some things that help a video go viral:
- Connect with the viewers - People are more likely to share something they can relate too. People in the midwest and east coast are going to relate more to a video that has someone stuck upside down in the snow than someone in the southwest.
- Evoke an emotion - It doesn't matter which one, but some of the best to work from are happy (funny or feel good), anger (expose something bad that people don't know about) or impressed (something that is just too good to not share).
- Be easy to share - This is probably the most obvious. Provide quick share buttons because if you don't the next button they will probably choose will be the close button.
Basically everything you do for this video is a calculated risk. That's why you have to commit. Go big or go home. Be willing to embarrass yourself or be willing to do something that people are going to remember and talk about.
And at the end of the day, have a lot of fun.
